The third year of this new millennium was overshadowed by the war on Iraq, the news story that most networks devoted their airtime and money to cover. Looking back, we see a period in which the voices of fear and alarm dominated the broadcast spectrum as oft-repeated warnings of the dangers of weapons of mass destruction popped up with as much regularity as Viagra ads.

With embedded journalists in the “theater” and retired generals in the studios, with Pentagon public affairs officers on the phone and White House perception managers pumping out the “message of the day,” this was the most sanitized and media-controlled war we have ever seen. Jingoism fused with journalism and news biz and show biz morphed into what TIME magazine called “militainment.”

Yes, it’s been another downhill year for the mainstream news media, as they continue to change from at the least the nominal guardians of the public good into shills for the government and their corporate sponsors. As you can probably tell from the opinions I’ve been expressing this year, I have little or no respect for them.